The Lockyers’ e-mail struggles

If there’s just one thing to take away from this past week, it’s that Bill and Nadia Lockyer really struggle with e-mail.

Just six days ago, a bizarre message sent from Nadia Lockyer’s address blamed her husband, state Treasurer Bill Lockyer, for hooking her on the drugs that ultimately led to her meeting Stephen Chikhani, the former boyfriend who is now alleged to have assaulted her in a hotel room.

She has disavowed responsibility for that part of the message.

Now comes an e-mail from Bill Lockyer with all the earmarks that suggests someone had hacked his account.

Under the subject line “Terrible Ordeal !!!! (HELP ME!!!),” the message read that Bill Lockyer was mugged while on vacation in South Glamorgan, a small county in Wales. Despite going to police and the embassy for help, he was “freaked out” and needed help settling his hotel bills, it said.

An e-mail seven hours later from Lockyer informed his contacts that the message was indeed from a hacker.

As for Nadia Lockyer’s e-mail, which was sent last Wednesday to the San Jose Mercury News, the Alameda County supervisor admitted responsibility for part of the message, suggesting she was going to harm herself. But “everything in regards to my husband was all added,” she said.

She said she hadn’t meant to imply she was going to hurt herself, and blamed Chikhani, who is under investigation for allegedly assaulting her in a Newark hotel room Feb. 3, for the majority of the e-mail.

Chikhani’s attorney denied that he had contributed to any part of the e-mail.

Either way, it’s probably time for the couple to change their passwords.